Revitalise Your Daily Life Through Vedic Wellness – Discover the Miracles of Panchagavya Ayurveda with Orrina

• Q. Tell us about yourself and your background.
• Navaneeth: We did our graduation together from VIT University. As far as our background goes, Aravindan is from an educational background and I am primarily a public speaker. He is a software engineer in a multinational company. We graduated as Gavya-Siddha doctors after completing our course this year. We have co-founded Orrina with an objective to raise awareness about Panchagavya products and therapy and the protection of native Indian cows.

• Q. Are both or either of you practising doctors?
• Navaneeth: Orrina has certain objectives to be seen as a premium lifestyle and wellness critical brand for the mass audience, so that people can purchase products for everyday use like tooth powder, hair oil, different types of juices health supplements, etc. which all have cow ingredients like cow dung and are based on Panchagavya. We practice because Orrina is a platform where we do get a lot of potential patients who would really like to cure themselves with our consultation and therefore we readily provide the same. We also provide customised medicines, so basically we make alternative medicines for ailments like diabetes, where you need customised medicine for the particular condition. We do that type of consultation as well and do cure people whatever the ailment, mostly chronic diseases.

• Q. What are your own personal interests?
• Navaneeth: I am a public speaker and have given talks at a lot of forums. I do this in my free-time and I make sure I also talk about Orrina and the importance of cows and Panchgavya. On the other hand, I take care of marketing as well as brand consultation, basically public relations. I also own another company.


• Aravindan: My personal interest is in farming and to be as close as possible with nature, so I go along with nature and stay in a hut. I love cows and dogs and I also have an inclination towards the ancient ways of living and learning and practising ancient medications. These are my primary interests. I am also mostly a people's person and love talking to and meeting people.

• Q. What led you to create Orrina and how did you go about it?
• We were classmates and always wanted to create something in the start-up ecosystem and do something very different. When we graduated in 2017, we participated in the Jallikattu protests and because of that we really came to appreciate what the cows mean to us. That's when we thought why don't we learn more about them and so we immediately left the corporate world and travelled all over India to study about Indian cows and organic farming.
  
  We also started studying about Vedas and Puranas. Cows are a very prominent animal in all the scriptures and are often depicted in temples. During that time we were introduced to a lot of universities and Ayurvedic experts. After detailed consultations with them we made unofficial intention for the next two years.
  
  We understood the concepts and practices and thought that this could be the right area for ourselves, so we also got expertise as doctors. We didn't want to be the person who creates a product just on the basis of some permutation-combination. We wanted to create a brand and a lab. We wanted to be people who also have expertise in conducting meticulous research and development. So we immediately enrolled in a government recognized university's Ayurvedic doctoral program and now we are certified and have a lot of plans for the future.

• Q. Tell us more about your education in Ayurvedic medicine.
• We are Bharat Samaj Sevaks which is a government-run body that provides the Ayurvedic doctors' course, and we have also completed our MD in Panchagavya, a masters course in Ayurvedic medicine, from Panchgavya Vidyapeetham. The first one year was devoted to theory, followed by intensive practical activities for the next 2 years under one guideship. Some of the important requirements for the practical part were – you need to own a cow, you need to have your own farming, you need to ensure that you have your own production unit where you can make medicines and products and where you can treat people and make observations of your patients. The entire course duration has a total span of 3 years and Orrina was actually one of the projects we did during that course. We didn't want to wait until we graduated. So we thought that until we have the knowledge why not just give it as a therapy and not a lifestyle brand. So we started acquiring knowledge in marketing.
  
  We found a niche space where a lot of Ayurvedic brands are growing in India but not all are farming brands. We built more trust and credibility towards it through more effective communication. We studied the market and thought we should start working on this. It is not a brand or a line of products that will bloom overnight. People don't just go for cow urine products simply because they are good. They do have a lot of confusion in their mind. Not everyone trusts stuff like that. It is a sensitive topic and a sensitive ingredient. I could say, cow urine and cow dung were the biggest challenges for us. That's why we have thought that we don't need a brand. We need expertise here to tell you what is good and what is right. What is it famous for and why should people go ahead with it? There are a lot of good points to take it far and you need to build a personal brand as well. This is the reason that we dedicated our lives to this and we want to take this further up.

Where Can You Find Them?

• Q. What is your process and how do you formulate products listed online?
• The products that are currently listed online are completely Ayurvedic with nothing being derived by us and everything is available in the Vedas. The thing that we did from our end was we made a few changes in respect to the current generation to make sure they are extremely effective. The diseases in ancient times were completely different from the diseases nowadays. Today people are different, positions are different, environment is different, work cultures are different and everything else is different. Formulations made centuries ago during a different time will not work today if they are made exactly the same way as before.
  
  Ayurveda is actually better than allopathy because Ayurveda is biotic and allopathy is antibiotic, hence it has a better success rate in the market. But there is a gap between the oldest tested formula and the current generation and its lifestyle. We did take time to do a lot of research, with the help of many mentors. There are also government regulations. So keeping all these regulations in mind we thought about how this can impact the current generation in effective ways.
  
  For example, if there is a hair serum which is nothing but gomutra, I cannot just give you a bottle of gomutra. Everyone tends to go out socialising a lot and they will not use something like that. Now, how to make it a product they will want to use is what the challenge is. We have taken the formula to the lab and taken off the smell of the gomutra – the ammonia factor. We researched the chemical and the composition as much as we could and tried to turn it into a product people are much more attracted to. The combination of the package, and the final product is made for the current generation. That's what we had to do to the traditional formulas while replicating them.

• Q. How do you ensure quality?
• Anyone who comes to our factory or production place cannot find two machines, we have only one machine. So everything is handmade. We grow more than 80 per cent of our herbs, only a very few ones, for instance Ashwagandha which grows best in the North Indian soil, are sourced from our partners. Otherwise we have local farmers and local gardens, nothing is machine treated and everything is hand treated. So the quality is maintained.
  
  Cows are of the tribal people who have been taking care of them for hundreds of years. We were fortunate enough to have become partners with them. We uplift their economy and in turn we get raw materials from cows that roam free in the forest area. Even then we don't use all the cows and have very limited cows to ensure that they are the best, their health is very good and also we can take the best raw materials from those cows, and we do periodic health check-ups of these select cows. We use Ayurveda in packing too and use 100 per cent glass packing for biochemical reasons. We use a lot of different colours of bottles so that the medicines don't get effected by the colours of the bottles.

• Q. What makes Orrina products different from those of other Ayurvedic and health brands?
• To sum it up, Orrina is unique because the concept is very unique – we are making a premium brand of Panchagavya products. Secondly, Ayurveda is not a single brand or a single therapy, there are a lot concepts in it – reiki is a part of Ayurveda, energy healing is a part of Ayurveda, sound healing is also a part of Ayurveda, colour therapy and essential oils therapy are also a part of Ayurveda. They are all part of Ayurveda just like Panchagavya is also part of Ayurveda. It cannot compete with Ayurveda because its nothing but a child of Ayurveda. So where we stand alone is in Panchagavya which is a very big sector.
  
  But in Panchagavya we are trying to work in that niche where we will be one of the leaders in the near future. Reiki is a healing methodology, it's nothing but energy and it works for some people. We play with herbs and cow healing and It works for different people. It is a big science. Orrina is special because it's unique by itself. And Panchagavya is nothing but integrating the cow into Ayurveda. In ancient times everyone had a cow of their own. But now everything has changed and not everyone can have one cow at home today so we provide therapies that bring the benefits of cow products.

• Q. What's next for Orrina?
• Our plan is to start an open clinic and try to make a treatment centre, then slowly expand that into a hospital. Right now the critical thing is that we need to build more awareness. Orrina is just not an Ayurvedic or a therapeutic brand where people will come and buy lifestyle products. For this fact to be understood, people will need to be educated. They will need to understand the therapy first. For example, 15 years ago yoga was also not very popular. We don't want to go to market and sell a thousand products, that's not our goal. We want to take it to the cure and to the therapeutic aspect of it.
  
  Let's say, we have 10 clients this month, we want those 10 customers' ailments to progressively improve every month. So, we are trying to keep it very slow and we are not looking at the income also. Orrina is a brand which is trying to ensure that when Panchgavya becomes very famous gradually, we will be one of the leaders.

• Q. Are the sensitive ingredients part of the challenge of growing this brand?
• Currently, the market is still not ready for such products, to be very frank. We are trying to be a part of this market growth and we are ensuring that when the maturity comes we will be the market leader and guide for such products since we would have already built a brand and quality. So we are ensuring that we are looking for investment and not undertaking this fully on our own. We want to take it slowly about the quality not just from our end but from the customer's end as well.

• Tell us about some aspects you need to educate the market about.
• Let's say you are one of our customers. You shouldn't buy our product thinking that your hair will fall or your hair will not fall from using it. We want you to understand the seriousness of the product and we want you to be disciplined. This is because it is not something that you just buy, apply and move on. The efficacy of our products or the kind of wellness we want to promote is 50% from our product and 50% from the user's lifestyle.
  
  That is how Ayurveda actually works. Making people understand this is a big challenge so we want to do it slowly. It's about using our therapy and making lifestyle changes to get rid of ailments from the root. Let's say if a diabetic patient goes to an allopathic doctor he is only given insulin. Ayurveda Panchagavya isn't like that. I have to tell him what is diabetes, what is the reason for being diabetic, and he can't go for a simple chemical treatment and expect his illness to disappear. He will need to use therapy and control it. At the same time he needs to change a lot in his lifestyle. He needs to avoid so many food items, avoid so many lifestyle issues and also needs to stop working at night. I shall ask him to avoid night shifts as he needs to have proper sleep that's one of the reasons for diabetes.
  
  Consultation is one of the major things to brings quality people in place and not just time. It requires a lot of discipline. So we have taken it up slowly and the next thing goes quality consultation keeps them aware keeps them for reference. We can also study them in their progress and then implement them on a larger scale.

• What about the average consumer who does not want or need correction in their health?
• Orrina is not just a therapy it's a lifestyle product. We already know how cows can impact our life and we offer something through which you can maintain your health and create a good lifestyle. So if you drink distilled cow urine every morning it will just do wonders in your life. Orrina is a lifestyle product and we don't concentrate only on people's ailments.
  
  Orrina is actually a life changing brand so instead of using some other shampoo you can use our shampoo bar. We have a tooth powder too. We are trying to integrate the cow into everyone’s lifestyle. We don't have much medication on our website and we do only a limited number of patient consultations currently. Let's say a cancer patient comes to us, we will give him our prescription and he can buy the medicines or he can buy our other products and use them as supplements to other treatments.

• Making the best of both worlds
  Allopathy is something that should be in today's world because diagnosis is very much required. But allopathic treatments can cause issues not only in a patient's lifetime but in his future generations as well. Today if my father has diabetes I will tend to have diabetes. It is one thing that my father has diabetes but why should it be a part of that gene or a part of me and why should I have to pass it to my child? That's something Ayurveda actually does not do.


• Break the notion of lifelong medication
  Allopathy is all about medicine and allopathic doctors don't expect much discipline. Its basically 90% antibiotic and 10% extra something. It is easier to treat with allopathy but the consequences are bad. Ayurvedic products on the other hand are very effective because in any Ayurvedic stream, it requires 50% effort from our end.


• Self discipline is half the work
  The patient needs to be very disciplined and change his lifestyle in certain ways. That is the reason a lot of people are coming to Ayurveda. But customers need to have very clear expectations and they need to be very disciplined, otherwise only consultation will not help. If the customer is not disciplined he will think that this therapy is not effective.